By Rosemary Iwunze

THE Nigeria insurance sector has recorded a milestone with   Gross Premium Written, GPW, crossing the   N1 trillion   mark for the first time to   N1.003trillion at the end of the 2023 the financial year.

The growth represented a 27 per cent increase from N790 billion recorded in 2022.

National Insurance Commission, NAICOM, disclosed this in its   2023 fourth quarter report released yesterday which showed that total assets stood at N2.67 trillion at the end of the year.

The Non-Life business accounted for 61.3 per cent of all premiums written during the year while the Life segment contributed 38.7 per cent, valued at N388.1billion.

The market also recorded retention of about 87.7 per cent for the Life business, just about 54 per cent for Non-Life while the aggregate market average retention stood at 66.7 per cent during the same period.

Major growth drivers in the non-life segment of the market were Oil & Gas and Fire Insurances, contributing 27.3% and 24.1% respectively.

In a direct reflection to the ongoing regulatory measures regarding claims settlement, the Life business recorded about 95 per cent of net claims recorded during the year while the market average stood at about 71.4 per cent of the N536.5 billion gross claims reported at the close of fourth quarter, 2023.

In a direct reflection to the “no-premium no-cover” policy of the Commission, the outstanding premium continue to decline, posting a 1.6 per cent as outstanding of all the premiums generated in the market during the period.